How fit is 'hunting fit'?

[Araboo27]

Hey all, never hunted before but I'm keen to give it a go this coming season Only had my mare for a couple of weeks so it's very possible we won't be ready in time but working towards it won't do any harm though so could anyone point me in the direction of a sensible fitness regime to work through please? She's in fair fitness at the moment but even as a hunting novice I know she isn't up to it at present..it's probably a difficult question to answer but how will I know when she's fit enough?

 

[PorkChop]

Depends when your local hunt starts autumn hunting - but no reason why she won't be fit enough.

If she has been in regular work until you bought her then I would just build on that.

For my pure hunters I used to start walking in June, then introduce trotting end of June/July and canter in August. I would be more worried about getting any excess weight off more than the fitness, so assess her condition and formulate a plan! I am still old fashioned in that I do do roadwork, albeit walking, and trotting up hills.

I would use Autumn Hunting to increase the fitness until by opening meet we would be ready to roll

Hope you have the best season with your new horse

ETA - To assess fitness I observe how quickly they recover after some faster work, then re assess a few days later so I am aiming for an improvement in recovery time week on week.

 

[ester]

Also it might be worth saying you don't have to stay out a full day. I have to hack each way too and we only get out about once a month so although fit my oldie never gets super fit from it (he just doesn't work as hard at home as with the excitement of a bit of hunting!) so we usually stick to about 4 hours- and that is with plenty of standing about- I can usually feel when he has had enough (although he often disagrees and then jogs home to make a point ). Hunting suits him, canter around-rest-canter around again- rest . Depends on the pack though, autumn hunting is a lot more of the standing around than the cantering so she would definitely do that with a basic level of fitness.